On Parliament Hill
by Casscaro
Summary: These are a series of 1000ish word scenes following Spike's journey, all linked by being set in the same place, Parliament Hill on London's Hampstead Heath, but at different times over more than 100 years.
1. 1862

**1862**

The child's collar rubbed against his neck. Newly starched and pristine, Sunday-school white, it worried at the delicate skin. He fought the urge to tug at it with his fingers, and concentrated instead on keeping step with his father, his treasure clutched to his chest. It was his birthday. He was eight years old and he was going to sail his new toy yacht.

The Heath was busy in the spring sunshine, full of day trippers taking advantage of the new railway to escape the foul atmosphere of the City and take the crisper, cleaner air of the parkland. The child knew this would not please his father, that he disliked this influx of people, the coarser accents of the inner city transported to the refined atmosphere of Hampstead. A group of boys ran past, shouting and laughing, brothers clearly, chasing a hoop that the eldest bowled before them. The child watched them longingly. He wished he had brothers to run with. Looking wistfully over his shoulder, he hadn't noticed his parents had stopped and he walked into his father's back, earning himself a harsh word and a severe look. He blushed and looked down at his feet, feeling the ready prick of tears. He felt a hand brush his hair and looked up into his mother's soft, sympathetic smile. He smiled back, resisted the urge to bury his face in her long skirts.

His father was talking to a stocky, red faced man. The child frowned. He knew this man. His name was Mr. Underwood; a very important man and a business colleague, his father had told him. The child did not like him. He didn't like the way he spoke to his father. His father seemed to shrink in stature in his presence, his manner nervous, almost like… like the servants at home. There was a word for that; his tutor had taught him. The child frowned in thought. _Subservient_. Yes, that was it. He didn't like his father being subservient to this man. Today, Mr Underwood said, he was enjoying the Heath with his family, taking some time away from the pressures of his work which were an increasing irritation to him, given the 'circumstances in the colonies.' His father shook his head sympathetically. Mr Underwood introduced his wife, a tall, slim woman, richly and elegantly dressed. The child peered up at her, frowning, and she peered down at him. Her nose was so far in the air, he thought, she looked like the giraffe he'd seen in the zoological gardens. She sniffed dismissively and turned to smile coolly at his mother. The child decided he didn't like her either and pressed closer to his mother's skirts. Then he spotted the girl. She stood quietly next to her mama, eyes primly downcast, pink rosebud lips curved in a quiet smile. Her curling, soft brown hair was held back from her heart-shaped face with a blue ribbon that matched the blue of her sash, and the child thought he had never seen anything quite so pretty. She looked up suddenly and caught his open-mouthed gaze. He swallowed and smiled tentatively. The girl watched him solemnly for a moment, then slowly and deliberately blinked and turned her head away. The boy's smile faded.

As they walked away he looked back over his shoulder. The girl was standing watching him. She smiled quickly before turning and skipping off to her parents and the child's heart gave a strange flutter in his chest. He blushed and stumbled over his feet, earning himself another sharp look from his father.

But as it turned out, the conversation with Mr. Underwood had put his father in a good mood. He crouched beside the child and helped him fix the rigging on the yacht, told him how to set the rudder, explained how the keel would keep the toy upright. A cool wind danced over the ponds and the sun was suddenly hidden by a bank of grey cloud. His mother frowned and fussed around the child, worried about his "delicate chest" and lack of overcoat. His father stopped her with a frown and she subsided, eyes downcast.

The boy looked on as the little yacht caught the breeze and danced across the water. It headed steadily across the pond, bobbing gently on the swell, the small blue flag on top of its mast fluttering gaily. He ran around the pond to meet it at the far side, picked up the yacht and ran back to his parents, laughing delightedly. Heedless of his father's warning to check the rigging, he launched the little yacht, watched it speed across the water in the stiffening breeze. The sudden gust caused consternation around the pond. Hats broke free of pins, parasols blew inside out and a sudden storm of dust stung the child's eyes. The yacht dipped under the onslaught of the wind, struggled to right itself. By the time the child had wiped the dust from his eyes, it had disappeared beneath the dark waters of the pond.

He knew he shouldn't cry. He knew his father would despise him for the show of weakness if he did, but the sob was too large for his small chest to contain and it escaped before he could stop it. Immediately his mother crouched by his side, wrapped him in her arms and soothed him.

"You smother the child." He heard his father's muttered words, glanced up at his averted face, the play of muscles in his jaw he'd come to recognise as contempt. The child pushed himself away from his mother and dashed the tears from his eyes. He set his lips against his loss and they turned their back on the ponds and headed for the hill. He managed to resist the urge to look back.

High above the City, his father knelt by his side and they looked down as he pointed out landmarks – the hard, grey snake of the river just visible in gaps between the crowded buildings, the soft green dome of St Paul's, the new Houses of Parliament, still not complete but already the ponderous heart of government. London. Centre of the world. From here Empires were built, civilisation spread on wings of trade. He should feel proud and honoured to call it home, proud and honoured that his father had a part in keeping the important wheels of commerce turning smoothly. The child tried to feel proud, shivering in the cool air, aching for his lost toy. He sneezed miserably and his father sighed. He stood up and placed a heavy hand on the child's shoulder. His mother, hovering close by, smiled and took her husbands offered arm. Together they set off home, to tea and cake and the travel chest in the hall, his father's talk of sailing the oceans and his mother's anxiety.

It was his birthday. He was eight years old.

The next day his father sailed away and he never saw him again.


	2. 1879

The quotes are from 'A life of John Keats' by Charles Armitage Brown

**Part 2**

**1879**

"_He was small in stature, well proportioned, compact in form, and, though thin, rather muscular;--one of the many who prove that manliness is distinct from height and bulk. There is no magic equal to that of an ingenuous countenance, and I never beheld any human being's so ingenuous as his. His full fine eyes were lustrously intellectual, and beaming (at that time!) with hope and joy."_

It was getting too dark to read now. He closed his book with a sigh, rested his chin on his knees and stared out over the vista before him. London in the twilight at the end of a bright, autumn day. There was just enough of a breeze to shift the miasma of heavy, odorous air that normally clung to the streets, to leave the jumble of buildings, old and new, clear-cut and gold-leafed by the final rays of the day. The evening sun danced on glimpses of the distant river, its light… _its light_… he frowned in thought… _gleaming_… yes, gleaming. _A good word_. He picked up the small brown notebook he always carried, wrote a few lines in his cramped, elaborate hand, and then closed the book again with a satisfied smile.

Somewhere in the distance a bird was singing, the last bastion of day challenging the encroaching night. The notes shrilled bravely, crystal clear in the purple-hazed air of sunset. The young man closed his eyes and listened, rapt.

_My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains  
My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk,  
Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains  
One minute past, and Lethe - wards had sunk:  
Tis not through envy of thy happy lot,  
But being too happy in thy happiness, -  
That thou, light - winged Dryad of the trees,  
In some melodious plot  
Of beechen green, and shadows numberless,  
Singest of summer in full - throated ease._

He held his breath as the bird sang on. Perhaps this glad creature was a descendant of the very nightingale that had inspired those glorious words. Perhaps Keats had been sitting upon this very spot sixty years before when the pain of his life was touched by the wonder of the bird's song, when he wrote of leaving the world unseen, to "Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget." He pressed his own hand to the earth and felt he could reach back through time to touch the poet's. He breathed a sigh as the final liquid notes dripped into the quiet well of the evening. _So beautiful. So heart-rendingly beautiful_. No wonder the poet's soul had been stirred. This was why he walked the heath, to feel this connection with the great who had once done as he did now, found inspiration in this green oasis. Shelley, Coleridge, Keats – all had walked and talked and shared the thoughts of their great minds on this very ground.

But it was Keats he identified with, Keats with whom, here on the hill, he felt connected. He had, he was sure, a special link with the poor misunderstood poet, driven to an early grave by – what was it Brown had called them? "_Hirelings, under the imposing name of Reviewers_." Yes, that had been it. A genius judged by fools who could not see the truth. He felt the young poet's pain. He _understood_ the beauty of a soul touched by Calliope, blessed by Erato. A poet's soul, a gentle thing, too beautiful for the crass world.

"_HERE LIES ONE WHOSE NAME WAS WRIT IN WATER." _

Keat's own epitaph, given to his closest friend days before his life faded away in the heat of Rome, all hope gone, so far from the cool green fields of his homeland. That one so great should die so young believing those words. The young man shook his head in sorrow. They were brothers in their art. Not, and he smiled self-deprecatingly at the thought, that he considered his feeble scribblings to be in any way a match for the soaring words of the great poet. But they came from his heart, poor thing that it was, and they were his truth as best he could form the words. That truth overflowed its poor vessel, threatened to breech its frail walls. But it must be kept within, unnamed, allowed only a sweet anonymity in his writings, because the time to share that truth had not yet come.

But soon… _oh, soon_…

Next year he would come into his inheritance, the annuity his careful father had arranged to begin at an age he had felt would befit a man to find a wife. And he would then be able to be open, to finally admit his true feelings.

_Cecily._

He breathed the name on the breeze, felt the surge of his heart, the flush of blood to his cheeks at the thought of the sweet and gentle object of his affections. Next year he would be twenty-six years old, the age at which poor Keats had died of a broken heart and lost hope. But _his_ heart was full of hope and swelled in his chest with love and anticipation. His future lay before him, bright with expectation. Next year he would dare to declare his love and his life would begin anew. He would offer her his hope, his heart and his soul.

On Parliament Hill he dreamed of a life full of love given and returned, of peace and calmness and hearth and home.

His future stretched ahead of him.

Next Year.


	3. Autumn 1880

**Part 3**

**Autumn 1880**

"_Becoming a vampire is a profound and powerful experience. I could feel this new strength coursing through me. Getting killed made me feel alive for the very first time." _

She danced for him in the moonlight. Sinuously swaying in the silver night, she unpinned her long black hair and let it snake free down her back. He lunged for her and she slipped through his arms, laughing, dark eyes flashing. He laughed with her, lunged again, chasing her shadow among the myriad moonshadows on the night-greyed ground as she twisted and twirled and teased.

The moon dazzled him. She dazzled him. He threw back his head and laughed at the sky.

He looked for her again and saw her silhouetted against the sky, holding out her arms to him. He ran to her, exulting in the newfound strength of his limbs, effortlessly scaling the hill, filled with a new potency. At the top he caught her, pulled her into a tight embrace, alive to the feel of her slim form pressed against his. His mouth was ravenous on hers, voracious, and she laughed against his lips. His body ached with an unknown hunger that burned hard in his gut, a craving that tore through him, howling for release. Need. He _needed_… needed… this… more than this… _something_…

And there it was. He pulled his mouth from hers, searched the hill, blue eyes sparked with new gold. The smell… the _taste_ of it in the air… warmth, humanity, life… _the essence_.

She followed the direction of his gaze. "Fee fi fo fum," she smiled slowly. "Ah, I know what you want, my darling, deadly boy. I think it's time." She slipped from his embrace and disappeared into the shadows, leaving him to burn with the intensity of anticipation.

When she reappeared she was leading a girl; thin, her clothes worn and much repaired, sharp features a mixture of apprehension and boldness, hunger and desperation at war with fear. "Mummy's brought you a present. See? Pretty little dolly." She gave a short laugh. "Says she'll let you kiss her for silver sixpence." She brought the girl towards him, gave her a push to send her into his arms.

The girl gasped, but stood firm, tilted her chin toward him. "Sixpence first," she muttered defiantly.

He grinned, reached into his pocket and drew out the small silver coin, held it up then snatched his hand closed as she went to grab it, pulling her harder against him.

Behind him, his dark lady ran a hand up back, caressed the nape of his neck beneath the tangle of soft curls. "_Boys and girls come out to play, the moon doth shine as bright as day_," she leaned against him, whispered in his ear. "Playtime, my wicked, wicked boy…" she growled, her hand locked tight in his hair.

He looked down at the wide-eyed girl, felt the pull of her hot fear. The shift of his features, the feel of the sharp teeth descending, was black ecstasy, embodiment of the darkness that yammered its need in his core. The girl's sudden frantic struggles meant nothing to him – everything ceased to exist except the vulnerable pulse in her slim throat, the hot smell of the blood beneath the pale, dirty skin. He hesitated only a second before instinct took over and he drove his fangs into her neck.

Part of him cried out against what he was doing, some remnant of humanity shuddered in horror as the rush of dark blood filled his mouth. He gagged in panic, swallowed reflexively, felt he was drowning in the sudden overwhelming surge of heat. For a brief moment he fought against the vice-like grip on the back of his neck as he tried to poll away from what he was doing. But then the essence of her blood filled his mind, and all other thoughts were gone in the need to drink, to consume, to devour. He could taste her, beyond the hot, metallic salt-tang of the blood – he could taste the complexity of her individuality, her strength, her weakness, her hunger and, intoxicating in its intensity, her surging terror.

Potency. _Power_.

He swallowed compulsively, growling in frustration as the pulse of her life weakened and the warm flood slowed, as the exhilaration of the blood-rush began to fade.

He dropped the lifeless body, gasping for breath he didn't need, looked up to find her watching him and gave a slow, rapacious smile.

"There's my clever, _clever_ boy." She reached up, smiling seductively, wiped a smear of blood from his lips and licked her fingers clean slowly, purring with pleasure. She held his head, turned him to look out over the city. "Look down there - all the pretty ones for us to play with. Shall I show you? Shall we prick them until they bleed?" She took his hands and stepped back, looked up at him from under lowered lashes. "Ripe cherries ready for the picking. We'll feast ourselves on their sweetness."

She dropped his hands and drifted over to the crumpled shape on the ground. "Oh, dear. Dolly's broken." She looked down, sighing sadly. "Won't play anymore." She smiled over at him, demon to demon, yellow eyes glinting with wicked glee. "Never mind. Plenty more in the toyshop."

He swung her into his arms and they danced to the wild joy of his laughter under the cold, bright stars. His body sang with possibilities, his mind burned with hunger.

He was dead.

What was left of what he had been cringed within him; a sad, pathetic creature, mewling its fear at the night. He shut it from his mind in disdain, buried it deep. The grave-dirt clung to him still, but he had never felt so alive. The raw desire that coursed through him, the sense of power, the wild recklessness that set his nerves flaming with cold fire – _this_ was alive. A sudden hard calm washed over him.

"_HERE LIES ONE WHOSE NAME WAS WRIT IN WATER." _

They would blaze a trail of terror across Europe, he and his dark queen, and he would write his name in blood and glory.

On Parliament Hill she taught him what he was.

And he revelled in it.


	4. Winter 1880

**Part 4.**

**Winter 1880**

He ran, arms pumping in time to the pounding of his feet on the frozen earth, body-memory of a need gasping ice-cold air into lungs that no longer needed it. His redundant breath steamed in the night, blood-warmed, its heat stolen from the sweet young life he'd drained.

He could hear them clearly; shouts and curses, the bark of a dog. _Bloody hell_! They'd brought a dog! He hated dogs; useless brutes, vacillating between sickening, fawning servitude and blind, animal viciousness. The dog barked again, deep and ferocious in the darkness, eager for the chase. Seemed this one was of the blind, animal viciousness variety, then.

_Keep running._

The inexorable power of his limbs still filled him with exaltation, strength sang in his muscles, drove him across the hard ground effortlessly.

_Getting closer._

The ground steepened and the heath became more open, exposing him clearly in the winter moonlight, raising a shout from his pursuers, and still he ran on.

_Not long now._

At the top of the hill he stopped and narrowed his eyes, peering into the night. Ahead of him, the spluttering light of burning brands and the steadier light of lanterns picked out a second band of men closing on the hill. They'd come across from the other side of the Heath. He glanced behind him, picked up the shapes of the group with the dog lit by more torches. He was surrounded.

_Trapped then, was it? _

They approached him cautiously, formed a wary circle, suddenly silent, unsure, the sight of the slight, tousle-haired man at odds with the monster of their imagination. One man moved a reluctant step closer and his dog, a huge black brute, snarled at the end of its heavy leash, hackles raised.

_Dog knows me._

He smiled at their hesitation, dropped his head and bent forward, hands on thighs, as if gasping for breath.

_Always loved a good hunt_.

A low, murmur of uncertainty began in the mob, and they shuffled uncomfortably.

_But the best bit?_

He looked up again, smiling ferociously, demon full to the fore.

_Getting caught._

As the men looked on in stunned horror, he lifted the gore-stained railway spike clutched in his hand and twirled the heavy iron effortlessly. The dog whimpered and cowered back against its master's legs. He grinned at it. _Good dog._ He looked around at his hunters – eight to one, not counting the dog

_My kind of odds _

– assessing, waiting for the one who'd be first to make the move, the one braver or stupider than the rest. It was the man with the dog. With a yell of unholy glee, he launched himself into the fight.

The dog fled.

He'd brought the hunters where he'd wanted them. Here, where he knew _they'd_ be. He knew he was watching, him and his women… _my _woman…_she's **my**_… he bit back the black rage, turned it against the nameless man, shattered his skull with a single blow from the spike, kept on beating the pulped head into a bloody mass, snarling with anger. Grabbed from behind, he swung around with a roar, caught another man a stunning blow that left him crumpled and bleeding next to his fallen friend. The rest of the men hesitated, eyed the spike warily. He looked down at the lump of iron, shrugged and dropped it on the ground, raised his hands to show they were empty. _Liked it better this way, as it happened - nothing but fists and fangs, way it should be. _Emboldened by their greater number, the remaining six men rushed toward him.

_Playtime._

A whirlwind of fists and feet and rending fangs, demon-driven, shattering bone and tearing flesh, blood spraying the night-greyed ground with drops of darkness, screams of pain and despair, a final desperate plea for life, the green-stick crack of a snapped neck…

And then it was over. Silence. Eight broken bodies lay on Parliament Hill and blood, black in the bitter moonlight, steamed gently in the crisp, cold air. The frozen ground was churned and broken, glinting with dark gore. He stood in the midst of the mayhem and waited.

A shadowy figure detached itself from the tree line, made its way toward him, looming darkly through the darkness. He watched him come, grinning triumphantly, tongue pressed against teeth, eyebrow raised in challenge.

The punch sent him reeling, flat on his back amongst the havoc he'd wrought, staring up at the bright, dancing stars. He shook his head to clear the red mist that blurred his vision and looked up into brown eyes colder than death, a sneer rigid with contempt. He tasted blood and touched his split lip with his tongue. For a moment he stared up at the looming figure, jaw tensed, anger vying with a sudden surge of childish hurt. Then he threw back his head, lay back among the devastation and laughed. And from the shadows she laughed with him, his dark queen, and clapped her hands with childlike joy.

He kept his eyes fixed on the figure standing over him, cocked his head with a grin. Then the railway spike was swinging powerfully towards his skull, glinting duly in the cold light of the moon. His smile flinched, but he forced it back, hiding the sudden rush of fear tried not to recoil as the metal bar buried itself in the ground next to his ear. His grandsire held his gaze, anger working the muscles of his jaw, then turned away without a word, back to where the women waited. The older woman glanced back briefly, placed a placating hand on his arm and reached up to whisper something in his ear. He stopped, shrugged the tension from his shoulders, turned and stalked angrily back, reached down to pull the smaller man up by his collar like a whelp, raised a hand to strike him, and paused.

In the distance, the raw sound of anger made harsher by fear, the rabid sound of a mob on the move, intent on revenge. The hand dropped. They stood, eyes locked. He flinched, gaze sliding away from the scorn and derision, the deep, dark anger in those hard brown eyes. The grip on his collar tightened.

"We leave. Now. We'll deal with this later." The words were no more than a growl, menacing with intent, and he staggered as he was thrust backwards contemptuously.

He watched them walk away, saw his dark lady stop and turn to blow him a kiss before drifting back to her sire's side. The others didn't look back. He looked down and kicked moodily at a bloodied corpse, sharp-boned feature marred by a scowling pout. _He'd show him. _One day he'd do something _he'd_ never even _dreamed _of. He looked up and glared after the retreating figures. He wasn't going to spend the rest of eternity skulking around in the shadows, fighting fights he knew he was going to win, taking the easy route to evil. He was bloody well going to _live_ this unlife.

Wiping the blood from his nose, he followed them off the Hill.


	5. 1967

1967

The boy sat slumped on sun-parched ground still warm with the heat of the faded day. Around him, humid evening settled toward sultry night, set a strange, heavy calm like a pall over the hill, muted the distant sounds of city traffic to a distant, muted hum. Groups of people, heat-lazy in the late summer evening sat or strolled, talked quietly and laughed softly. Lovers entwined arms, legs, lips, languid under the warm blanket of the encroaching darkness. Among them all, the boy was so clearly, achingly alone. Occasionally he pulled at the yellowed grass fractiously, dropped the torn blades and pulled again. He reached up to push the tangled mass of his hair back from his face. His features were delicate, boyish softness hardening towards manhood, the promise of beauty marred by the unhappy set of the full lips, the deep frown creasing his forehead. He wrapped his arms around his legs, hugged them close, rocked himself gently.

_A boy with problems._

In the shelter of the trees, he watched the boy, waiting. The sky was slipping to summer-heavy darkness when he finally made his move, schooled the feral smile into softness, pulled back the hungry yellow in his blue, blue eyes.

_Playtime._

The boy looked up at the sound of his voice, eyes suspicious, mouth set in a ready pout. The man smiled easily and held out the spliff that smoked gently between his fingers, cocked an eyebrow. The boy hesitated, want wrestling with worry writ clear on his face. But he took the offered smoke, lulled by the man's soft brown curls and ready smile, drawn to his lean good looks. The boy drew deeply and closed his eyes, didn't see the quick, rapacious smile as the stranger settled at his side.

_Candy from a baby._

It took no time at all. The boy was pathetically eager to talk, to tell this understanding stranger how he felt, of the confusion of his life. He listened quietly, offered no opinion, no condemnations as the soft fingers of cannabis seeped through the boy's mind, relaxing and soothing, opening the doors of his conscience, giving his fears voice. Suddenly nervous, the boy drew deeply on the remains of the spliff, let out the smoke on a slow sigh and an admission. The big thing. The thing he'd admitted to no-one before – not even himself. His eyes winced towards the man, fearing rejection, fearing disdain, met instead a knowing smile that made his heart leap. Lost in the blue of the stranger's eyes, he held his breath and waited.

_Ah, I know what you want…_

The man leaned forward and kissed the boy gently, waiting until shock turned to tentative, nervous response before sliding the tip of his tongue between the boy's soft lips. His hand trailed slowly and lazily up the boy's thigh, fingertips just brushing the worn denim, teasing, feather-light. The boy groaned against his mouth as his trailing hand stroked, bucked as it cupped his groin.

He could taste him – his excitement and arousal and fear. He pulled back, looked down into the boy's heavy-lidded eyes, and smiled. He stood up, held out a hand, head cocked, eyebrow raised in query. The boy didn't hesitate; he took his hand and allowed himself to be pulled to his feet. He started back for the shelter of the trees, away from the groups of late night star-gazers, all so rapt in themselves they barely noticed the lean, pale-skinned man and his follower. He grinned.

_Come to mama._

In the trees he turned back to the boy and pulled him deeper into the shadows. Smiling, he pulled the boy to him, met the clumsy kiss with his own knowing mouth, let his hand move to the waistband of the boy's jeans and slip slowly inside. The boy gasped, pushed himself against his cool, firm grip; skilled fingers that easily brought him to the brink of release. Smiling, he pulled back, pressed his tongue against his teeth with a smirk as the boy moaned at the loss of contact. Smiling, he gave the demon reign, watched the passion turn to horror, buried his fangs in the vulnerable neck, drank deeply of sweet, young blood, rich with the complex intoxication of arousal and terror.

_Just the way she liked them._

She slipped from her watching place in the deep shadows, ran her hands across his back, pressed herself against him as he drank, mewling like a kitten, her teeth nibbling at his neck. He pulled back from the weakened boy, turned to smile at her, to kiss her blood-red lips with his gore-wet mouth, smooth the dark hair back from dream-distant eyes. He handed the boy to her, smiled as she growled her gratitude, features shifting, and lunged at the boy's bared throat.

He wiped the blood from his mouth, licked the back of his hand clean and left the shelter of the woods to his dark queen and her prize, shrugged out of game face. The moon was full now, high in the summer-heavy sky, casting moonshadows through the still branches of the trees onto the hard-baked sward. He strode back up the hill, the need still raw in his gut, his walk big cat-graceful, eyes watchful, predatory.

At the top of the hill he stopped. The city stretched below him, lights twinkling. Millions of warm, life-rich bodies going about their pathetically small existences, so many of them looking for something, quietly desperate, high on God knows what. Easy pickings for him and his. The smile faded. It was all too bloody easy, too easy to win. Needed a bit of excitement in his life.

Time to find a bit of mayhem. Or cause it.

_Time to move on. _

South America, maybe – she was always so happy there, and a bit less… _well, barking, to be honest_… away from the old hometown. But then – there was the temptation of finding himself a nice little trouble spot and stirring up some fun.

His roving eye fixed on the slight form of a girl silhouetted against the sky, swaying gently, arms upraised at the moon, her long hair a silvered wave down the length of her slim back, scattered with faded daisies from the broken chain woven at her crown.

The smile was back – feral, rapacious.

_Then again, there was something to be said for easy pickings…_

Winter in Mexico, it was.

And then, springtime in Prague had a nice ring to it…


	6. 2004

**Part 5**

**2004**

The bottle was empty. He shook it and peered at it carefully to be sure, but he had to admit the truth of it. With a sigh he placed it carefully on the grass at the end of the line of its six similarly alcohol-devoid brothers. The glass chinked softly. _Cheers_, he giggled softly. He peered at the bottles for a moment longer, pouted, then turned to look out over the city. _Oh, pretty lights._ What could he see? Dome of St. Paul's – no change there; big, phallic-looking pointy thing, all lit up and sparkly like a big… _gleaming_… he snorted… _whatever_; fucking great big wheelie thing that he was bloody sure hadn't been there last time he looked; Houses of Parlimini… Parmili… _Parliament…_ Yup. London. He frowned. Seemed he was still in control of most of his faculties, then. Clearly not nearly drunk enough.

He turned to look at his companion, nudged the sleeping form and was rewarded by a grunt and a loud snore. _Bleedin' ponce._ No head for liquor. And what was with the snoring? Since when did he breathe, let alone snore? He glared at the other man, then raised an eyebrow and looked around cautiously. Carefully he reached over and teased the dark, gelled hair into two pointed horns on top of the sleeping head. He squinted and admired his handiwork. _Not bad._

He looked back over the city, trying to draw something from its familiarity. It had seemed a good idea at the time, this little diversion. Yeah, OK, so they had to get back to LA, but where was the hurry? And it wasn't like good old Blighty was far out of their way and all, not with the evil empire's jet at their disposal and Wolfram and Hart UK falling over themselves to help out. _Speaking of which…_ he picked up an empty bottle and waved it, eyebrow cocked, at the liveried driver waiting discreetly, if somewhat uncomfortably, a few yards away. The man winced and raised his eyes to the darkened sky, but disappeared obligingly enough.

He grinned. Travelling with the big man had its advantages. There was one hell of a bar in that limo.

Where was he? _Oh, yeah._ _Good idea at the time._ He'd had the sudden urge to be somewhere familiar, somewhere that held memories for him – memories that didn't involve… _her_. Some vague notion that he could prove to himself he had had a life before she'd come into it and he was quite capable of having one now she'd gone out of it. She'd clearly done the moving on thing, so… he closed his eyes with a groan and put his head in his hands.

_The bloody Immortal!_ What the hell was she thinking of? Of all the stupid, brainless, dim-witted… He shook his head and set his jaw. No – her life, her decision. He was good with that.

_Like hell._

"She said she loved me!" He pointed an accusing, if somewhat unsteady, finger at the sleeping lump and got a loud, incoherent grunt in return. "She bloody well did, too," he muttered, pout firmly in place. He stared off into the distance. But she hadn't meant it, he'd known that, leastways not like he needed her to mean it. _Ah, but,_ the small still voice inside wasn't giving up, _a little bit of you hoped that maybe she did…_

He felt suddenly, and annoying, stone cold sober. It wasn't working. Even here, looking down over a city she'd never seen, there were memories for him. Memories of the quiet moments when he'd watched her sleep and let himself dream of one day showing her his homeland, fantasies of being here with her to lay the ghosts of his past.

_Stupid git._

Well, it clearly wasn't going to happen. She had got herself the new life she'd wanted, the chance to be normal, and OK, if she chose to waste that chance on… on _the Immortal_… that was her decision. He had no claim on her, and she had no claim on him. Own man, here. He sighed. Except for the fact that he still loved her with every fibre of his being, naturally.

_Fuck._

What was that bollocks he'd spouted to Buffy and the poof that time? Something about brains and blood… 'Love's bitch', that was it. He glared out over the city. Well, not any more. Had enough of buggering around at the whim of some bloody female or other. Gonna get himself a life… unlife… whatever. This was one vampire who was swearing off the whole love thing and finding something better to do, something that didn't fuck with your head so much. Right. New leaf. As of now.

For all of half a second he almost believed it.

He sighed. "C'mon, mate. Time for the off." He stood up, nudged his companion with his foot.

"Wha'?" A confused mumble. "We moving?"

"Yeah." He hauled the bigger man to his feet and hooked his arm over his shoulder. "Movin' on."

In the absence of any better offers, he might as well hang out with Peaches a bit longer, get a few kicks from annoying the crap out of the tight-arsed sod. And of course, if ever this 'destiny' bollocks paid off and tall, dark and forehead got his sandshoes, someone had to be there to save him from himself and vamp the bugger back again. Meantime, there was always the Blue Meanie to play with. He winced. When the bruises from their last little bout of play had faded, anyway. Besides, way things were shaping up it looked like there might be enough opportunities for a bit of demon arse-kicking to keep him amused until something really interesting happened. Yeah. Who the hell needed a woman complicating things, anyway?

Together they made their way down the hill towards the limo waiting to take them back to the jet and the long flight west to face the music. There was still the little problem in LA to sort out; small matter of a lost head.


End file.
